


no ray of sunlight's ever lost

by senseof_Hygge



Category: ONEUS (Band)
Genre: Fantasy AU, Fluff, M/M, Non-Explicit Sex, Not Beta'd, POV Alternating, RaWoong as skirt-wearing boys in the woods, mostly youngjo's pov tho, no i will not be explaining why this is a fantasy au, prince!youngjo, the rest of Oneus as cats, theyre in love and thats a great thing, witch!woong
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-10-24
Updated: 2020-12-25
Packaged: 2021-03-08 20:08:43
Rating: Mature
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 6
Words: 13,423
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/27172228
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/senseof_Hygge/pseuds/senseof_Hygge
Summary: Hwanwoong is a powerful witch, imprisoned for simply existing, wondering how to escape when a stranger offers him a way out for a price.  The stranger is Youngjo, the only son and heir to the throne, and he's been cursed to become the next dragon of the century.  They find love in each other regardless.Update: Main story is finished, follow along for some slice of life drabbles!
Relationships: Kim Youngjo | Ravn/Yeo Hwanwoong
Comments: 33
Kudos: 108





	1. no ray of sunlight's ever lost

**Author's Note:**

> the more you read this the more you'll realize that woong being a witch and youngjo being a dragon-man-person-thing is less important than the fact that seoho keeps bringing dead birds into the house and leaving them for keonhee to find and cry over.

They don’t tell him how long he’s been here, chained to the wall with nothing to his name but the clothes on his back and the saccharine smile on his lips, innocent as the day he’d been born. He tells them as much to wane his boredom though it doesn’t seem like his captors are all too quick to believe him. They’d deemed him guilty the moment they laid their hands on him, stripped him bare of his possessions. The bracelets he'd threaded were first to go, sliced clean off and ground into the dirt before they reached for his satchel of herbs next, had been gruff about the way he cursed at them, leaving him with his too-long skirt and worn boots.

It takes a few more rises of the sun for Hwanwoong to really begin to feel the slow, choking way anxiety makes acquaintance with him, leaves him shaking a little, pulling his shirt tighter around the collar a little dumbly, like that will do anything to stop the nerves from rattling at him like a broken little doll.

By the time the days begin bleeding together in a series of shattered sun rays flitting through the prison windows, gruelly mess of meals, and the dirtiness of his dresswear, Hwanwoong feels less like a man and more like a sewer rat. He can’t remember the last time he’d slept well, so gripped with worry it feels hard to breathe some days, can’t help asking again just how long he’d been here even though his words fall on deaf ears. 

He’s not stupid.

He knows they think he’s scared of them. He lets them think that.

It’s a lot easier to catch them off-guard when they spend their time looking away from him, letting them laugh at his weak face and knobbly knees when he casts a look their way, lets them think this fear is for _them_.

The assumption they have of him is not entirely incorrect either: under their raised hands and lowered gazes, they call him a potion-brewer, the harbinger of disasters, they say he courts death and kisses it farewell when he’s done playing around. They say he speaks in backward tongues, in dead languages and in forbidden words to flirt with the afterlife. They call him a witch, disgust evident on their face as they spit the word out, cackling lowly when they tell each other he’s supposedly unarmed, left with nothing but bare wrists and a thin skirt. Even the skirt they’d checked under for any concealed weapons as if Hwanwoong would ever carry something so _archaic_.

Hwanwoong is a witch, of course he is, though they don’t stop to think that he could be anything more and that is their folly.

He’s more worried about how long it’s been since he watered his plants, really. They’re finicky little things that groan when given too much water, too much sunlight, or too little attention and goodness if any one of his familiars have started nipping at them he-

Well, he should probably find a way out of here before he goes crazy at the thought.

A stranger finds him in the quiet of night, when time slows like molasses and Hwanwoong stays awake, eyes catching on the glint of his bonds and shifting around just to hear the sound of _something_. The stranger stands just out of reach before coming under the moonlight drifting through, revealing a beautiful face and a broad body drowning in layers, a set of keys resting upon his hip. He smiles at Hwanwoong.

“They call you a witch.” he says by way of greeting. His voice is warm and calming, a little shaky but Hwanwoong supposes that has more to do with being near a witch than anything.

“I prefer the name Hwanwoong, to be honest.” his eyebrows draw close in astonishment, but a smile plays across his lips at that,

“Well, Hwanwoong, do you know when your death sentence is?”

“I hardly know what my offense is.”

“Ah,” he huffs out something of a laugh, “well you and I both know you are to be hanged for being a heretic. I could help you escape, though.”

“And what is the price for my life?” Hwanwoong can’t help but ask, though he knows he’ll accept in spite of what conditions are laid before him. He isn’t a spineless man but he would deign to have his life end here, in the deep of ground fighting over carcasses with rats that know nothing else but this way of living.

“Simple,” he says, and grabs at the ring of keys, twirling them once, twice, before catching a dull key in his hands, “my life.”

“Who even are you?” Hwanwoong can’t help but laugh, “why is your life so important that you’d risk the freedom of a witch against the behest of the king?”

“So you _do_ know the king.” the man says, his voice lilts weirdly with thought, as if he held secrets to the world Hwanwoong was not privy to. A ridiculous notion, really. Hwanwoong was born of the winds and grass, fed by the skies and reared by the ocean, has seen death up close at the hands of rodents and kissed the plagues with his own tongue, he _is_ the secrets of the world.

“I’m a witch, not a hermit.”

“Kim Youngjo,” he introduces himself finally, bowing with a flourish and face screwing into a weird half-smile that has Hwanwoong feeling just short of shy, suddenly feeling like his worn clothes and greasy hair are a bad first impression, “the one and only son of the king.”

Astonishment would not even begin to describe his feelings.

They slip past the only guard on duty, careless as that man is, Hwanwoong winces in disgust at the line of drool framing his ugly unkempt beard, and thanks his Gods that this is the last time he’ll ever see him again. The keys are set neatly against the table beside him, candle now blown out as Youngjo steals away with him into the night. Hand in hand they go, up spiraling staircases and strangely empty corridors, closer to the fresh air that Hwanwoong hasn’t felt in so long now, yearning for the breeze tickling against him.

“There’s a horse waiting for us,” Youngjo whispers against his skin, pressing close into his space and hand still wrapped around his own,

“At night? Are you crazy?” he bites back, “Any noise would be a death sentence to the both of us.” and to that, Youngjo has the decency to look just a tad embarrassed, face no doubt colouring in something akin to shame if he were not cloaked by the dark

“So… you would prefer we walk then?”

They walk.

Their fingers are still laced together and Hwanwoong thinks with something close to giddiness that it feels nice, having a hand to hold, with Youngjo’s thumb idly stroking index finger as he lets himself be steered through the thicket. Hwanwoong knows the forest better than he knows himself, feels the force of its life coursing through him the moment he’d crossed the threshold from clear civilization to the lawless woods, moonlight losing its way once the leaves seemed to sew themselves shut atop them. 

There he had discarded his filthy boots, caked in mud from when he’d made a try at escape the first time the knights had found him, no doubt stinking as well from how long he’d had them on. He digs his toes into the dirt, feels the coolness settling between them as he sighs, lets the life sing to him as he feels his way back to his little home.

“How can you see?” Youngjo asks once the busting of the town life had bled away to moving underbrush and small critters chittering. Hwanwoong squeezes his hand fondly,

“I don’t need the light to see where I am in the woods. This is my home, I would know it anywhere.”

Hwanwoong hears the hum of understanding though he isn't quite sure if Youngjo really understands what it means to be so at home, what with the way he'd so readily uprooted himself and run away from the only life he's ever known.

Relief has never been so palpable than when they'd breached the thicket into a small clearing, quiet as all else as moonlight gently shines back into their vision, touching upon the stone of Hwanwoong's house. He feels his shoulder sag, tension bleeding out of him as he tugs on Youngjo's hand not so gently, eager to be home again.

-

Of all things Youngjo thought he would do today, running away from his home had not been on the list at all. Though, with a pretty darling by his side clasping hands with him, he can't find it in him to complain all too much, especially not since...

Well.

He supposes he's to die eventually, in the arms of a boy with big, sleepy eyes and a proud nose is not the worst way to go.

They'd been on their feet for hours, the woods swallowing them whole and not bothering to spit out their bones even, Youngjo pants a little harshly, unused to being on the move for so long with a stranger as his eyes, the only tether between him and sure death by the forest's maw. Not for the first time tonight, he thinks of how he put his life in the small, delicate hands of a stranger. A pretty stranger, no doubt, but a stranger nonetheless.

Hwanwoong leads them up a few steps through a large set of heavy, wooden doors, skirt swishing up the stairs as his bare feet pad against the cold stone. Hwanwoong feels around for a match and lights a lamp, just enough to illuminate what looks like a well lived in living space.

It's big enough, with a fire still crackling away as if it hadn't been tended to for the past few weeks, a soft, worn chesterfield piled with similarly worn throws, and many greying books set out, opened at different pages and left to bare their secrets to the world. Youngjo can't help his wandering eye, this is all so foreign, like he's been plucked out of his own world and placed in a different dimension entirely.

It's cozy. 

"Do you live alone?" Youngjo asks, though it seems the house has been lived in even with Hwanwoong's absence. Hwanwoong huffs a little laugh, smoothing down the front of his skirts again and tucking his feet under him a little consciously of himself,

"Not … particularly."

As if on cue, a yowl rings through the house, breaking the serenity and bringing instead the thunderous applause of paws thudding against wood. Youngjo has half a mind to be terrified before they round the corner into view and he finds four… cats.

They're a little larger than the cats Youngjo has seen around town, well fed in the way the strays hadn't been, tumbling over one another in what he hopes is a play fight. Hwanwoong presses back a high-pitched, embarrassed little sound and he swoons, attention veering immediately back to the little one.

"Seoho, Geonhak! You two stop it right now!" Hwanwoong yells, sweeping two cats into each arm, effectively stopping the fight. Almost as an afterthought, he hisses quietly, “We have a _guest_ over.”

Youngjo shuffles on his feet, feels all four pairs of feline eyes turning towards him, equally expressive but distinct. He makes eye contact with one cat cuddled in Hwanwoong’s arms, firefly eyes blinking owlishly at him, and he decides that one is the troublemaker.

“Cats, huh?” he makes idle talk, watching as the four furry companions make good work of climbing Hwanwoong with a cacophony of noises, from hissing to purring and every squeak in between,

“Well,” Hwanwoong stops a white, downy cat from nipping at his hair, “they’re supposed to be my helpers.”

“It looks like they kept house for you while you were… away.” Youngjo says a little unsurely, watching as a black cat with striking golden eyes ambles up to him, spine curving upward with each step it takes. Bless its heart for still being brave enough to approach him.

“More or less. Geonhak, knock it off, he’s a _guest_.” Hwanwoong chides, stepping forward to nudge the black cat away with his bare foot. Youngjo catches a flash of the pinkness of his toes and feels his face heat inexplicably. “Now,” he turns to Youngjo, smoothing a hand through his hair and grimacing at the grease, “before you tell me anything else, let’s get a bath drawn for us yeah?”

Youngjo nearly trips over himself to follow, like a moth to light, through a dimly lit corridor, stepping over stray plants and more books, hears Hwanwoong grumbling about his finicky _plants_ and all he can focus on is the back of his neck, delicate and pretty.

-

The nerves tickling at Hwanwoong are new. He’s never quite been within arms length of such a handsome man, stripping out of his robes and tabards, slipping the final layer off his shoulder just the slightest where Hwanwoong catches the sight of his muscles rippling finely, breath catching as he also begins to unbutton his shirt. He’s shy suddenly; has not known shame after living on his own for so long, has not had another person in the flesh for as long as he can remember but his face burns despite himself and it could not be anything else.

When Youngjo pulls his shirt off fully, he sees the markings upon one blade that halts his breath for something else entirely. Not a tattoo, not a warrior’s scars, no, this is deep and maroon, like autumn leaves when the season bleeds slowly into winter. It’s in the shape of a claw, talons rich and sharp, like a maw of a beast, and Hwanwoong realizes it’s-

“I’ve been cursed.” Youngjo hums softly as long, beautifully tapered fingers stroke at the mark. His eyes are downcast and he’s in his underclothes only now, but he seems less than worried about that,

“Cursed? Not at all,” Hwanwoong can’t help the blitheness his tone takes, fingers raised in silent approval, “this is a blessing.” When Youngjo laces their fingers together quickly, unnecessarily, before pressing Hwanwoong’s fingers across the red mark, he colours a little at the affection. 

“How is this a blessing?” Youngjo seems a little put upon, settling into the bath and pulling him along. The tub has never felt so cramped before.

“You’ve been chosen, Youngjo,” he whispers, can’t help the awe that bleeds into his voice, can’t even see past the power of the marks to his naked body, “there hasn’t been a chosen one in so long.”

“Chosen? This is a curse.” Youngjo wraps an arm around his waist and pulls him in, fitting their bodies snug against one another, his lips find purchase on his neck, speaking softly, “My father would have my head if he ever found out.”

“Hm, so you think I can help you undo this… curse?” Hwanwoong lets himself be held, pressing impossibly closer into his space, attraction cresting inside of him at every glide of their bodies together. His hands run against the lines of Youngjo’s back, feeling the corded muscle moving underneath his fingers, up to the blades of his shoulders and feeling small, unnatural bumps rising along his spine. “Darling,” can barely stop the endearment that slips past his lips unbidden, “it’s already begun.”

“I know,” Youngjo replies, a little defeated, but so, so warm against him, “I just… I had to try _something_. Gods, I couldn’t be a sitting duck in the castle waiting to be put to death by my own blood and flesh.”

Hwanwoong feels something protective about Youngjo, from his forlorn eyes to his demure smile, he’s a captivating thing. If he doesn’t take kindly to being blessed by the last dragon’s wish, then Hwanwoong can do little else but brew him a cup of tea to ease his transformation. It’s a shame, he thinks as he rubs soap into Youngjo’s hair and giggles when he keens into the touch, he thinks if given enough time, he would have fallen in love, it feels as inevitable as the setting of the sun.

-

Youngjo wakes to soft light warming his face, rays playing gently with parted curtains and the smell of fresh flowers wafting through the room. The blanket he clutches is thin, thinner than the ones stuffed to the brim with goose feathers in the palace and he’s sure he should be a little panicked now, if not for the way he languidly stretches out and the suppleness of everything around him; he wants for nothing else but this moment right here.

The empty space beside him spurs him out of bed more than anything, sees one of the cats at the corner of his eyes, perching on the headboard of Hwanwoong’s bed, not hissing but not kind either.

“Where’s your owner, hmm?” Youngjo asks, a little groggy still as he pulls on a shirt Hwanwoong had rummaged out from the deep recess of his chest for him. All his clothes seem to be big and billowy on his lithe frame, tucked in at the waist or hemmed at the ankles to fit his stature better. He forgoes the bottoms, still a little too warmed from sleep to need them, as he follows the cat’s soft padding out the bedroom and into the kitchen space. Hwanwoong has his back to him, swathed in a tawny skirt that drags against the floor and a loose-fitting cardigan already covered in cat hair. A black pot sits beside him, bubbling away with something Youngjo would rather not hazard a guess on, and in the crackling of the fireplace sits a cast-iron kettle, hissing softly.

“Good morning, sleepy!” Hwanwoong greets them, the cat he followed winds through his legs and trills happily, leaving Youngjo to stand dumbly at the precipice of the entrance.

“Morning.” Youngjo sighs out a little blissfully, one day out of his old life and already so in love with the sight in front of him. He supposes this might be falling in love is like, so new but already so infatuated that he is. Hwanwoong grabs the whistling kettle from the fire and pours it into a cup, 

“I made you some tea. You’ve no doubt been experiencing some growing pains,” he sounds a little flustered, perhaps nervous for hosting another person in his little home, “this should help with it.”

Hwanwoong is not wrong, either. These past few months have been terrifying; Youngjo’s teeth had grown pointed, he’d been fighting a sort of primal hunger he didn’t ever want to address, and his skin feels too tight on his body _all the time now_. It’s not a kind feeling and to have to battle it with no knowledge of what he’d gotten himself into those first few months had felt like drawing his sword against the darkness and grappling with nothing but intangible shadow. He takes the cup gratefully, finds it particularly fragrant with the scent of hibiscus and honey, perfectly normal.

“You were up so early today.” Youngjo says softly, trying not to sound like a petulant child, leaning into the soft hand that strokes gingerly at his scalp

“I had to fix my plants. Never leave Keonhee alone with the plants and herbs, he’ll eat them all.” Hwanwoong groans, though a little humour laces his words, “Besides, I forgot which book had all my brewed tea recipes in it, I had to make sure you were doing all right.”

“I can’t thank you enough,” Youngjo keens in earnest, looking at Hwanwoong, watching his eyes glow a little gold, like sunlight shining through an empty glass on a cloudless day,

“For what?”

 _For what_ he’s really not sure but Youngjo feels suddenly that this little one must know just how elated he feels to be here, sitting pantsless with a tart cup of tea in one hand, the other petting idly through the soft furs of the biggest, most skittish cat he’s ever seen, staring at the face of someone so lovely he’d have gone to war for him, probably.

If Youngjo were not such a coward, staying cooped up in the castle day and night, hiding from the people who shared the same thoughts as him, perhaps he could have been a loved figurehead one day. Perhaps he wouldn't have been cursed by the last dragon in the world, living under the nose of the one who hunted them for sport. It’s a curse, no matter how Hwanwoong’s sweet tongue spins it, to be living under the watchful gaze of a bloodthirsty tyrant of a father. 

Instead, Youngjo stands to his full height, a little clumsy on his sore feet from last night, and brings Hwanwoong into his arms, hands wrapping around his trim waist with an intimacy that’s been there ever since they met. He presses their foreheads together then, sways them gently as he closes his eyes and thinks about how pretty the line of his eyes are, the flutter of his lashes, the pinking of his cheeks like the petal of a lily.

Hwanwoong leans up and presses their lips together, Youngjo all but sighs into it.

At night Hwanwoong tucks him into bed with another cup of tea - this one more earthy - and settles beside him, a thick book laying open on his lap, stained and frayed around the edges, as he cradles a fluffed up white cat in his arms.

“His name is Dongju,” Hwanwoong introduces, as Youngo’s fingers tickle at the cat’s little chin, earning a sweet, honeyed purr, “he’s the baby of the family. But careful-”

Dongju nips him several times on the finger in quick succession before clamping down and not letting go, 

“He bites?” Youngjo finishes, relenting just a little to the big, blue eyes of this critter before him.

“He bites.”

Over the next few days, he comes to know the cats as well.

“They’re my familiars,” Hwanwoong had said, “they help me gather plants and guard the place from any malevolent spirits. Well, they’re supposed to anyways. Seems there’s been a horrible case of overhunting,” he throws a pointed look at Seoho, a thin cat with big, firefly eyes and a wispy tail, fur the colour of sweetgum leaves in autumn, “and there’s not much by way of spirits around these woods now.”

Seoho is the most mischievous one, who likes to rile the others up in the name of good fun, plays fetch like a dog and throws himself out the window when bored. He’s a weird one, but he also gives Hwanwoong the most energy when he needs it. Climbing up his back and ripping little holes in his sweaters yes, but curls around his neck and purrs until Hwanwoong’s back straightens again. At night when he’s still trussing up flowers by their stems to dry, hands steady and sure, Seoho is there to paw at his skirts, swishing and swaying, until he gives up and gathers him for bed. Seoho is precious.

Then there’s Geonhak, a soot spirit of a cat, body black as night and eyes bright at moonlight, he’s the bravest of them and watches over the youngest of the bunch with a fondness Youngjo didn’t know existed outside of human capacity. He’s endearingly sweet, seems to pick the scariest tasks to do when Hwanwoong sends them on errands, and never comes back empty handed. He gets into the most scraps with Seoho, Youngjo has seen them batting at each other whenever Hwanwoong isn’t looking (even when Hwanwoong _is_ looking, it doesn’t seem to do much to dampen their spirits), but also knows when a piece of seared meat is thrown their way as a treat, Geonhak rips off half and feeds it to the other, as if he can’t fend for himself. Geonhak is endearing.

“Why do you call this a curse?” Hwanwoong asks him one night, fingers drawing mapping out stars on his skin, “To take the mantle of a dragon is such a gift,” he says with awe, “they are the protectors of the natural order, without them there would not be us.”

Youngjo slips his hands under his nightdress, feels the lines of muscle flexing under his fingertips, and kisses him senseless,

“My father hunted dragons for sport, he is the sole reason there is only one left.” he whispers, sighing when Hwanwoong nips at his chin before moving down to his neck, “It was only a curse for as long as I was under his roof, I suppose. When I’m with you, it feels like a blessing.” he confesses in earnest. What part of this life is a blessing, he’s not sure what to say, it feels so obvious it would make more sense to tell him what part _isn’t_ a blessing.

They come together that night, fronts pressed together with Youngjo’s hands wrapped around both their cocks, stroking them both until they’d both been squirming from oversensitivity. Hwanwoong nips when he’s excited, he learns with glee, as they’d chased their pleasures and his shoulder had been left with raw, red marks of perfect little teeth. They fall asleep with cum drying on his hand, only to be woken up later that night, curtains billowing in the summer breeze and moon brilliantly radiant high in the sky, from a long yowl tearing through the night and a horrible screech and bang. It sends him tumbling off the bed and Hwanwoong shuffling into the hallway as if on autopilot, working quickly to resolve the issue. By the time Youngjo cleans himself off in the bathroom, Hwanwoong has come back into the room, sleep still clinging to his eyes as he lugs Keonhee in by his midsection. They settle again quickly, cat draping over both of them like a scarf,

“Seoho brought a half-dead bird into the house again, scared the crap out of Keonhee. He’s gonna sleep with us tonight.” Youngjo can only acquiesce. 

Keonhee is, in every sense of the term, a scaredy-cat. When it’s especially quiet, the others having followed Hwanwoong out the door into the rain to gather missing herbs and flowers, Keonhee walks around and cries, jumping at his own shadow and hiding beneath Hwanwoong’s pillow, where his scent is strongest, safest, calmest, until his family returned. He tries though, bless his heart, and his soul is ever kind. One time Youngjo had woken up from a horrid dream, mood tepid and face pallid as he’d come to, shivering from the pain, skin grown too taut over his bones and aching with how they creaked in his ears. Keonhee had stood watch over him, eyes wide and shaking in every limb, but had stood strong. Keonhee is brave where it matters.

At some point Youngjo begins to wake with Hwanwoong, collecting his stray cups of tea and ambling into the kitchen behind his little one, tripping on their skirts and giggling into his hand. Hwanwoong had taken to wearing an apron over his sweet pinafores, gathering the dried flowers from the month before and working them with his mortar and pestle until it turned to powder. Geonhak winds around Youngjo’s neck like a scarf, had taken to Youngjo like a fish to water after their initial tenseness, and all but melts into his hands now. They both watch Hwanwoong work, Youngjo setting the cast-iron kettle into the fireplace that always seems to be flickering away, preparing breakfast and flipping a page or two on Hwanwoong’s book when he beckons.

It becomes routine.

Dongju trills happily when he paws at Hwanwoong’s skirt, nibbles on the laces of his boots, and bites like he’s still a teething kitten. He’s smaller than the rest but has the softest coat and takes great pride in that. He’d been the runt of the litter, from what Hwanwoong has told him, and every morning when Youngjo drinks his tea, Dongju sits at the table and nibbles on what looks like a small pellet. It’s extra nourishment, and helps keep his body strong, not that he doesn’t have three other familiars as his protectors already. And not that he doesn’t hold his own in a fight, when he pins their biggest, Keonhee, eyes gloating and feather-duster tail swaying languidly. More than once Youngjo has seen the white fluffball coming back from a hunt, flowers tucked between his little teeth and setting them on the table for the other cats. It must mean something to the others because the sight of those limp, dying flowers sends them all into a mess of purrs, mewls brimming with affection as they each take turns grooming him. Dongju is their baby but he’s happiest when he also gets to care for them.

The tea Hwanwoong brews for him each day and night helps with the pain when he remembers to drink it on time, and he’s not felt this good since before the mark appeared on his shoulder. He spends a little extra time smoothing down his skirts like he sees Hwanwoong do so often, and finds that it’s not about keeping appearances really, it just feels nice to do it. He gawks a little when Hwanwoong laughs at him, exposing a delicate neck that he doesn’t hesitate to press kisses to.

That too, becomes routine.

The transition gets a little difficult to handle sometimes. Youngjo catches sight of his irises glowing golden in the day and has to stop himself from ripping the mirror off the walls. He has horns growing in for goodness sake and _gods_ they hurt more than the time he’d fallen from a tower as a child and had to get several bones reset by the palace physician. They curl around his brow like a twisted crown, seemingly laughing at his former stature of a prince and he snarls at his own reflection, angrily turning away when he can’t stand the sight of himself anymore. Hwanwoong had told him the pain would recess, but had said nothing about the shame of looking so much like a _beast_.

“Look at me, darling, look at me.” a sweet, honey voice floats into his head and through his cloud of anger, Yongjo manages to look up, into clear, bright eyes, “There is nothing beastly about you. You are a gift.” Hwanwoong laces their fingers together, joining him on the cold tile of the bathroom, “You are a protector, _my protector_ , there is no shame in that.”

Youngjo can’t help but kiss him, swallowing his words until they turn into a litany of his name. When he takes him against the wall, Hwanwoong’s hands stroke the ridges of his newly grown horns, the scales cascading from his neck down his back, kisses his anger away until all Youngjo knows is that he’s been blessed with a _gift_ and had been foolish to think otherwise.

-

Hwanwoong knows they live on borrowed time.

Word comes from the capital that the king’s only son is missing, his troops scour every edge of the world looking for clues while the father stays cooped up in the palace, expression growing more sallow with each passing day. His place in the forest is hidden away safely, like a pocket of happiness, using charms he’d fought a clan of fae for. The king would be ill-destined to find his son, if he truly wished that. No, duty would force Youngjo back to face him more than anything, perhaps strike the king down if necessary, and when faced between staying here, stripping leaf from stem and glorious honour, he’s not sure which one Youngjo would choose. The thought irks him.

“Darling,” Hwanwoong tugs on his shirt, white and billowy, it fits Youngjo so well; he fills in the shoulder so beautifully, and had taken to Hwanwoong’s longer skirts with unmatched affinity, “do you like it here?” Youngjo looks a little bewildered, perhaps caught off guard by where the question had come from. His hands are stained green and yellow from the plants he’d been tying, sunlight catches his hair and the horns on his head lightens, almost resembling a halo.

“Of course I do.” he replies in earnest, his fingers wrap around Hwanwoong’s newest pinafore, “I’ve never been happier in my life than being with you.”

Youngjo kisses like a dream, slow and languid, petal lips pressing onto every bare inch of skin he can reach, almost in worship with the way he pleasures Hwanwoong. Lays him out on their bed, pressing into him with soft moans until he bottoms out, balls pressed flush against his body, asking, always asking how Hwanwoong feels. Hwanwoong reaches blindly for his hands, presses a kiss to each knuckle,

“‘m good,” he slurs, can’t quite think past the way the pleasure pooling in his gut makes his toes curl, “fuck me hard okay?”

Youngjo is devilishly good at obeying.

He’s tuned into Hwanwoong’s needs more than he lets on too. Some days when Hwanwoong doesn’t quite feel like himself, they become choppy and mechanical, the way he presses too hard with the mortar and pestle, carelessly tosses in a tied bunch of rosemary to the bubbling concoction cooking away on the fire, everything feels forced. Youngjo pulls Hwanwoong into his lap, settling them both into the reading nook, crowded by overgrown fern and ivy, leaves yellowing because _fuck he forgot to water them again_ and it feels all too much all the time.

Youngjo soothes him with calming circles on the small of his back, lets him tuck in nice and close, face burrowing into the cool skin of his neck as he fights the scream of frustration bubbling up his throat.

“It’s okay, baby Woong.” the nickname isn’t foreign, had stuck since the first time Youngjo had called out to him, months ago, “You’re doing perfect, baby.”

Perhaps, he thinks with hope clenching around his heart, their time isn’t borrowed after all.

-

“You can stay if you’d like.” Hwanwoong says one day, when they’re side by side at the clothesline, hanging their blankets up still damp from the tea that had been spilled. 

At daybreak, Seoho had once again come bounding into the house with a poor little bird, half-dead as it were, and rested it cheerfully on Keonhee’s spot on the bed, chirping happily when the other cat had all but _shrieked_ to the heavens and jumped onto the nightstand, where their cups of tea sat, cold now and long forgotten in favour of a few happy kisses before sleep, spilling it onto the throw and waking both of them up. 

Hwanwoong had grumbled all morning, even going as far as holding Seoho up to eye level and scolding him though Youngjo could see in the lazy swish of his tail that the little imp had no plans on stopping anytime soon.

His hands still in the folds of the blanket,

“What?”

“You love me, don’t you? I love you too. You don’t have to go back to a raging father who hates you for who you are, you can stay with me for as long as you’d like, forever even.” 

Staying had been a fruitless wish he’d told no one, simply because there was no one to tell but Hwanwoong himself. And sweet, darling Hwanwoong had been so patient with him as it were already, he’d never really thought forever was possible. 

But being with him is refreshing, like a tea being poured over a glass of ice, condensate pearling and running down in little gleams, calming and needed on a sun-streamed day. Youngjo's fingers catch on the lace of Hwanwoong's skirt, suddenly giddy with how much he loves him, how pretty the curve of his eyes are, how pretty the bow of his lips look.

“Am I really so obvious?” he asks.

“As the rising of the sun.” Hwanwoong giggles. They kiss under the sunlight, casting warm, elongated shadows that stretch onward forever.


	2. darling, there's a place that i wanna run with you

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Youngjo is a dragon, with dragon tendencies

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> from here on out it's just drabbles of their daily life shenanigans because i have a lot of ideas for this universe but no actual coherent plot ^^

The first of them to notice is Seoho, and by the Gods he is absolutely delighted with the discovery. It starts with a broken trinket that Hwanwoong steps on when he brings their basket of laundry in, sun-warmed and well-breezed, kicking it and hearing the clink clink clink as it rolls away. He can't make out what it's meant to be, crumpled and bitten beyond recognition, no doubt a toy Seoho dragged in, glinting with bits of golden shine, no matter how dull it is.

He finds it tucked in the corner of their bedroom later that night, Youngjo all but ignoring it as if this offending piece of scrap magically sprouted feet and scuttled into their room, as they peel back the duvet and fold themselves in against each other. Given that Hwanwoong is a witch born from the earth and sea, he supposes a little magicked… something or other isn’t too out of the ordinary.

Except, when he looks down the line of his nose to the love of his life, Youngjo resolutely does not look back at him, ears and nose blushed the colour of poppies and Hwanwoong suddenly feels that little trinket might be more out of the ordinary than it’s let on.

Seoho’s sleepy squeaks of delight only seem to confirm his suspicions.

He banishes the thought easily enough; there are far greater things that need tending to than a little well-worn trinket with faded markings and Hwanwoong has half the mind to chalk it up to Seoho playing some weird game to keep himself occupied. 

Youngjo has all but melted into his role of the forest’s protector by now, leaves for a few hours every day with his hands stained green from the stems he strings together every morning for Hwanwoong, and comes back with more than his fair share of scratches and bruises. He laughs something sheepish and giddy when Hwanwoong rolls his eyes and tells him to fetch the plantain leaves for the mortar and pestle, following quickly behind with his fingertips light as a butterfly’s wing against the back of Hwanwoong’s neck.

They spend the better parts of their evenings making salves and remedies for Youngjo’s flesh wounds, taking turns flipping the page to his oldest herbs book and following along, Hwanwoong applying the paste none too gently on him as punishment for his recklessness. Youngjo hisses but obediently does not move, letting Geonhak twirl around him for moral support, and laughs when the rough tongue licks at the palm of his hand.

At night they curl into each other on the bed that’s gotten far too small for six beings, Youngjo fusses with his too big tail that hangs over the edge of the bed and tries not to let it thud against the floor too loudly. It didn’t use to be like this, Hwanwoong can’t help but think, all his familiars had been independent and a little wilful when it came to sleeping arrangements. 

They all had their own places they preferred to sleep: Keonhee loves the cast iron skillet Hwanwoong has stashed on top of the fridge, curling up until he resembled a wildly outgrown potato and snoring a little too loud for a cat. Dongju had a taste for the softer things in life than just an unused pan; the little one had all but claimed a throw blanket - one that a kind old witch knitted for him over the winter when he’d fixed her thatched roof over the rainy season - marked with his fur and all, tucked in tail to head, and slept soundly.

Of course, wherever Dongju ended up, Geonhak the little panther was sure to follow. Before Hwanwooong summoned the last of their family, Geonhak used to patrol outside their home, taking down anything that seemed to come too close for comfort. Now though, he sticks to Dongju like a shadow, draped over him protectively and curled around him like he needs a protector.

Seoho? Why, by the stars, Hwanwoong has never seen Seoho sleep before and they’ve been a family for centuries.

Except now they all hobble into bed together, always when the moon rises high in the sky, listening to the sound of the fireplace crackling, and fighting for one of the two pillows. They settle around Youngjo like a second skin, Dongju planting right on top of his face, and the man only chuffs a laugh, one of the cat’s legs so he can breathe better.

The days pass by in languid, routine that finds him helping Youngjo maneuver his thick heavy tail in small spaces, making pastes and potions on commission, some tacky old ornaments worming their way into his home doesn’t make much headway in his mind. Then he kicks a gilded sparrow with a missing wing and things start falling into place.

Tucked into little pockets of his shelves, his closet, in between the cushion of his armchair, Hwanwoong starts to notice just how much more gold-laiden items there are now, old as they are. 

At dinnertime he finds a mended old teacup stashed in their cupboard, flecks of gold filling in the grooves of the cracks and uses it, not missing the way Youngjo’s eyes turn to him in rapt interest.

Youngjo is a dragon with _hoarding tendencies_.

“Darling,” Hwanwoong croons softly at Youngjo when they’re tucked into bed, fingers stroking at his ribbed horns. He watches Dongju kick his feet out in a mad scramble to gain purchase on Youngjo’s face again when he turns to face him again, can’t help the lovesick giggle that tumbles from his lips.

“Yes?”

“Want to tell me why you’re hoarding old gold of all things?”

Youngjo, the absolutely darling, sputters so hard Dongju tumbles off the bed and lands on his paws, looking a little harried but mostly affronted by this turn of events. His pupils, dilated and shaking, turn every which way except toward Hwanwoong.

“I, uh, I just, dear, oh dear -”

“- ‘Cause you know,” Hwanwoong cuts him off by reaching over to the nightstand and pulling out a little trinket box, handing it over to Youngjo, “we have this too. You don’t have to keep hoarding things that not even Seoho will play with.”

Inside the box is a locket, small and simple, but new enough that it catches the moonlight glinting through the curtains and shines brightly in Youngjo’s equally bright eyes. His love gasps, a little breathless and beside himself, fingers gingerly tracing over its smooth edges,

“Woong baby, is this for me?”

“Well, more or less.” Hwanwoong watches Dongju hop back onto the bed at the behest of Geonhak’s distressed - and dramatic - calls, fingers idly curling around the thick fur of Keonhee’s neck and their biggest feline settles between the two of them, “There’s an alchemist that can spin straw into gold.” he jests, feeling all the more in love when Youngjo barks out a sudden laugh.

“Is that so?”

“Yep,” Hwanwoong pops the ‘p’ for dramatic flare, “and he says that dragons shouldn’t be ashamed of hoarding things, even if they are old, sort of decrepit toys with little shine to them. Thought I could do you one better though and give you something that’s _actually_ shiny.”

Youngjo is too busy smothering him in kisses to retort. The locket hangs clean and bright around his scaled neck.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> come find me @pls9woong <3  
> hope you enjoyed!


	3. i'm afraid someone would steal you

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Youngjo's got a new friend. His name is jealousy.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> for myxhia, my stars and sky (and also a real bro)

There is a stranger in their home, who crouches down to get through their door and when he draws to his full height, Youngjo sways between abject horror and merrious wonderment at him. He looks human: a nice, even face, tender smile, no extra limbs or horns, no obvious tail dragging behind him, with chestnut hair and dark eyes. 

A tattoo of a red, red rose blooms on his neck and when Youngjo blinks once, twice, it slowly collapses into a bud.

He smiles so wide it could split the skies apart. He wears a drab coat that seems pinched in the shoulders, patched over too many times with different cloths and stitches messy, his pants are frayed at the hem and unevenly cuffed, but he looks clean and happy. He towers over Youngjo, limbs long and thin, like a weathered tree that had taken root long before he’d ever come around.

The room shrinks in comparison to the man; he seems to block out light from the windows and touches the ceiling with his height, shoulders pressing into the frame of the door. Youngjo straightens his back and locks his knees, drawing in a deep, steady breath. It's not fear he feels, something a little more apprehensive and nervous, discomfort gripping him in a way he hasn't really felt before, not even in the presence of his own father.

His eyes are ever kind when he introduces himself, hands wide and calloused, grip sure and strong when Youngjo musters his courage to take it. His hand disappears in the man's grasp and the sight horrifies him.

"I'm Yonghoon, it's lovely to meet you!" His voice is clear, like a sun-sweet brook, "Hwanwoong has told me so much about you."

Hwanwoong has not once mentioned this giant in front of him. His size is imposing in a way that makes Youngjo want to cower and whimper though the way he carries himself is placating and calm. Yonghoon raises his hands in surrender at Youngjo's lack of response, 

"Sorry, it must be unsettling to have me here, I tend to have that effect on … uhm, your kind." Youngjo knows he means dragons and those of ilk but he also can't help but think Yonghoon means it as a jab to his manhood. Youngjo bristles even further when he bodily moves into the kitchen with a burlap sack like he's been here thousands of times before. Has he?

The rose on his neck blooms again, petals spreading out and flourishing in front of Youngjo's eyes as the man starts opening the bag and pulling out a plethora of weathered plants, stems thick and wooden, and filing them away into different cupboards and between parchment sheets Hwanwoong had laid out earlier in the morning. 

Youngjo can't help the way the tip of his tail flickers in irritation, drawing the eye of Seoho who hones in on it and sets to chasing it in earnest. 

He's still standing there when Hwanwoong steps out of their bathroom, pink from the steam and lazily running a hand through his still wet hair. He stands swathed in a robe larger than both of them, showing off his smooth collarbones and red-bitten shoulders. Youngjo licks his lips at the sight. 

"Little Woong!" Yonghoon calls, eyes curving when he catches sight of him and Youngjo's mouth curls into a something dangerously akin to a snarl when Hwanwoong matches that intensity,

“Long time no see! How have you been?” Hwanwoong all but flies into his embrace, letting himself be picked up and spun around the kitchen once, robe falling off his shoulders to reveal his supple body underneath, pink and pretty. Youngjo’s thick tail thwacks against the wall so hard it shakes the frames hanging there - big, full leaves that Dongju brings back from his adventures, pressed between two panes of glass to keep their shape, oh my stars Hwanwoong is such a sap - drawing the attention of everyone in the room, including the cats.

For a moment, Hwanwoong stands stock still in the giant’s arms, eyes wide and shocked, before he sheepishly looks at Yonghoon, whose tattoo flickers between bud and bloom. Youngjo would be intrigued by it surely, if he were not so preoccupied with viscerally raising his hackles.

"Maybe this isn't the best time to be catching up, hm?" He jerks his chin to Youngjo's direction, who stands there and burns from the shame.

"Oh, of course of course! Our Woong is kept now." Yonghoon jests, which earns him a playful slap on the arm, "I'll get out of your way now, I'm sure you'll send for us when you need something."

"Thanks Yonghoon, I definitely will!"

"And before I forget, here." From the breast pocket of his coat, Yonghoon produces a single golden pendant and plops it into Hwanwoong's little palm, "you wanted this right?"

"Yes, thank you!" Hwanwoong is pink with pleasure, thumb rubbing over the face of the gem. His eyes crinkle cutely with his smile.

The pendant makes Youngjo's blood run cold. It's small and dainty with an amber gem in the shape of a teardrop in the middle and looks eerily similar to the locket that hangs around his neck.

Yonghoon slides past him, trying to look as small as possible with hunched shoulders and a curved back. He even looks a little apologetic at having come into their home unannounced but that brings Youngjo no comfort at all.

When the door shuts behind Yonghoon's towering figure with a creaky sigh, Youngjo feels like he can breathe again, before he whips around to find Hwanwoong still standing in the kitchen with his robe mostly undone, expression unreadable but lips upturned in a sweet, pretty smile. 

He feels weird, then. Standing just down the corridor to his darling but suddenly feeling as if it were a distance too hopeless to breach. When Hwanwoong moves, his robe rustles against the floor, a pleasing sound to Youngjo's ears usually but now seems to rub him raw in all the wrong places.

Yonghoon had looked so comfortable in their home, in their space, Youngjo can't help wondering just how long he'd been around before his bumbling self had lumbered into Hwanwoong's life. Between a man who's footing finds purchase in the glen and a man who can stands on unequal footing, Youngjo isn't so sure why Hwanwoong keeps him around, if there are men like Yonghoon at his beck and call.

Jealousy must know his name well, wears it out on its glib tongue and giggles when Youngjo's shoulders draw to his ears self-consciously. He's not a small man and he's only gotten bigger once he started turning too, chest broadening and waist filling in a way his purely human body couldn't. Yet.

His thoughts stray back to Yonghoon, with his deft and sure hands, his rose tattoo folding and unfolding, his gaze that could rival the depth of the sea and sky, and back to himself, a non-magic half-human thing who doesn't belong.

"Darling," Hwanwoong beckons him, a delicate finger turning his jaw. He stands on the balls of his feet to look Youngjo in the eye now, long gone are the days where he only has to tilt his head a little to regard him. "What's going on in that pretty head of yours?"

Hwanwoong kisses him, pressing their bodies close and Youngjo can feel the heat coming off him in waves, steam rising from his sweet smelling body,  
"He looks at you like you're his god." Youngjo says petulantly against his soft, warm mouth. There is no point in lying, he is no enigma to Hwanwoong, who sees him as clearly as the undisturbed surface of the crystalline lakes near their home.

"First of all that's how he looks at everyone.” Hwanwoong placates before kissing him again for good measure, “Second of all, it’s because I am.”  
It slips his mind often that Hwanwoong is more powerful than he lets on. That if the world ended and darkness stared out into the abyss, Hwanwoong would be staring back at it, eyes guile.

In the palm of his hand perhaps holds the sea of stars and his voice holds every Psalm in existence, Hwanwoong is a god in everything but name. Youngjo shudders unbidden, feels the tremor travel up his spine, fluttering like a butterfly’s wing.

“I know,” Youngjo sighs. Another kiss finds itself between his words, “I just…”

What’s he meant to say? Youngjo longs to be like Yonghoon. Born into this world, belonging to this world, belonging to Hwanwoong. Hwanwoong must understand this. He feels as though he reeks of jealousy at the moment, has always known the word but never the feeling until now. Back at the palace he had not needed to vy for anyone’s affections, had not wished to; standing in front of Hwanwoong whose mirthful eyes twinkle like dew catching in the sunlight, Youngjo wants to be worthy of him.  
“Oh, darling.” Hwanwoong sighs, the lilt in his voice dangerously low, smile teasing.

He hooks a finger under the delicate chain that holds his locket and pulls, Youngjo stumbling to follow so as to not snap it, fumbling to keep pace with Hwanwoong who makes a beeline for their bedroom, nudging open the door with his lovely pink toes, tugging him along all the while.

“What-”

“If I wanted Yonghoon, I would have him, no? And yet, here you are, and here I am.” the words should not work so well on him but all at once Youngjo can feel the tension bleed out of him like poison drawn from a wound.

“... You’re right. Baby, I’m sorry, I-”

He’s pushed onto the bed with little fanfare, overgrown tail thumping off the edge, he scrambles to hold onto the sheets when Hwanwoong descends upon him, straddling his thighs. Youngjo watches the worn fabric of his robe slip off, off, off that delicious body, evidence of his love littered on his skin like a map of stars. His hands settle on that trim waist but Hwanwoong grabs him by the wrists and pins him down.

“Be good, darling.” Hwanwoong kisses him slow and languid, “No touching, ‘kay?” his hands press over the curve of his horns and stroking just the right way that makes his eyes flutter. Youngjo thinks he’s nodding but he also only has half a mind at present. Hwanwoong’s fingers scratch at the expanse of scales at the base of his neck, Youngjo all but purrs, chest rumbling when Hwanwoong’s hands trail down to his nipples, tugging gently and sending jolts of pleasure through him.

They make quick work of whatever clothes they have left and when Hwanwoong works himself down on the tip of his cock, Youngjo’s fingers twitch with open want, longing to hold onto his waist. His hands find purchase in the bedsheets instead, letting Hwanwoong press hot, wet kisses to every part of his body to distract himself from the stretch of a cock breaching him, leaving a set of perfect little teeth marks in his wake.

He’s so much bigger now than when he first came here, body massive with corded muscle and when he looks in the mirror he’s shocked by what looks back at him but Hwanwoong salivates at the challenge of taking him, body opening up beautifully.

“Look at me, darling.” Hwanwoong beckons when Youngjo starts feeling floaty, grounded only by where they’re connected, the feeling of Hwanwoong tight and warm around his cock. It’s a struggle to keep his focus on Hwanwoong’s divine face, limbs feeling syrupy when he bottoms out, he moans a little brokenly when he’s kissed, can feel those plush lips pressing against him for just a second before he’s pulling away again.

Hwanwoong grabs his right hand and presses it to the smooth skin of his belly, feeling the slight raise when Hwanwoong grinds down on his cock again.

“Look at how well you fill me, darling. No one else can do this, hm?” Youngjo’s eyes flicker between the barely there bulge and the hooded gaze Hwanwoong sends his way, pleased by how good he’s making Hwanwoong feel.

“Just me?” Youngjo slurs, feels his words sticking together like they’re being stirred in molasses, the sound of their coupling ringing through his ears.

“Just you.” Hwanwoong assures him. He’s slowed to a gentle grind now, not exactly riding him in earnest but still, every movement of his hips sends jolts of pleasure through him all the way to the tip of his tail and the pads of his fingers. Youngjo shudders through his breaths, can’t help bucking his hips up to meet the swell of his lover’s ass, watches with rapt interest at Hwanwoong’s body takes him.

When he comes, he’s sure he sees the secrets of the forest around him, Hwanwoong’s hand never once leaving his body as he coaxes him through it. Youngjo feels safe.

“His husband made the pendant for us.” Hwanwoong says between bites on his shoulder, soft, pink tongue peeking out every so often. They’re laying in bed still, wrapped in each others, hands drawing stars on skin. It takes Youngjo a moment to pull out of his calm state of nothingness to answer, and when he does, he can only blink.

“...What.”

“Yonghoon,” his fingers never stop their listless pattern on his skin, “one of his partners is an alchemist, I’ve been asking for the amulet for a while but didn’t have time to pick it up so I asked it to be sent with Yonghoon.”

Youngjo’s face burns with the shame of knowing he’d thought himself in contest with a kept man. Hwanwoong kisses it away.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> find me @pls9woong on twt!


	4. i will not ask you where you came from

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> a look at their family, through the eyes of a cat.

Seoho likes to play around, spends most of his days making a mess of Geonhak's fur and running away, looping himself between Youngjo’s scaly legs to hide. He knows Geonhak has a soft spot for their dragon, feels their souls are connected somehow, someway, that transcends their corporeal bodies. They are kindred. 

Seoho takes advantage of that, quickly clambering up the man all the way to the top of his head, Youngjo teetering uneasily with the foreign weight atop his horns, hand finding purchase on the wall to steady himself.

Geonhak always hisses, hesitating in his chase for fear of hurting Youngjo - a darling notion really, Geonhak weighs about as much as a basket of pheasants, and Youngjo can breathe fire from his mouth - before Youngjo cradles them both to his chest and coos at them.

"Stop fighting," he says, words turning over in his mind, bored from hearing it so often, "Woong baby won't like it."

It's an excuse, all three of them know this. Hwanwoong has been alive for as long as the forest has breathed its first breaths, a wide yawning over the glen they call home, two cats violently pawing at each other barely makes him bat a pretty eyelash. 

No, it's Youngjo that doesn't like it, hates seeing them bicker all the time even though it's how they show their affection. Seoho, held in one arm, looks at Geonhak who sits in the other arm, and baps him on the head just because he can.

Another one of his favourite past times is scaring Keonhee with not yet dead rodents and fowl - he'd lugged a whole chicken home one time, who struggled and pecked him bloody, but the sight of Keonhee being so scared he peed almost instantly was worth it - leaving them in nondescript places for him to find. Once he'd managed to weasel one into the folds of their blanket, between their Hwanwoong and their dragon, right where Keonhee usually slumbered.

Youngjo nearly toppled the entire bed over, with how loudly Keonhee yowled, claws digging into the meat of his arm. Cats don't laugh like humans do but Seoho bleats out peals of laughter until his belly hurts.

Seoho doesn’t think he’s a mean cat, it’s just that he’s easily bored and finds his own fun in things, usually at the behest of others. Sometimes though, Hwanwoong picks him up in his tiny, tiny hands (Youngjo has big hands, soft from a lifetime of little work and gentle from inexperience in holding a cat that squirms as much as Seoho), and sways him to and fro and calls him a bully. 

Then he looks over to where Keonhee sits, positively beside himself with how hard he wails, and feels a little bad. Just a little bit. Just enough that he offers Keonhee his last honeyed orange peel, a treat that he fought Geonhak for, and grooms him until he purrs, chin sticky with the sweet.

He grooms Dongju in the wrong direction when he knows just how fussy he gets. Dongju's bite is far, far worse than his bark, so Seoho takes extra care to avoid the clamping of his jaw around any of his limbs, flickering back and forth when Dongju hisses at him to quit. He doesn't quit. Seoho holds him down instead, ignoring the kicking of his paws, licking him over and over and over. 

Usually when Dongju is being groomed, he likes it in one direction, from his head following down to the tip of his tail, same as the way his fur flows. Seoho smoothes his fur over from side to side.

When Dongju wrangles himself free of Seoho's grasp, he tears down the hallway to the quiet of Hwanwoong's study, smoke from the incense creating a foggy wall that he disappears behind and Seoho feels something similar to fear settle in him. Of all things in the universe that could reprimand him, Hwanwoong is the only one who serves him consequences.

Seoho chases after him but it's too late, Dongju sits in the rounded space of Hwanwoong's arms, big blue eyes frowning at him. Hwanwoong tsks him,

"Seoho…" to which Seoho looks everywhere but at Hwanwoong, "Did you fuss our baby again?"

He trills sadly, hopping onto the heavy oak desk to bare his belly cutely, blinking his eyes owlishly at Hwanwoong. Dongju may be quick to irritation but he's also quick to temper it, melting out of Hwanwoong's arms to join Seoho. 

Dongju grooms him until they both fall asleep, the scratching sound of Hwanwoong's feather tipped quill against parchment a nice, even lull. When they wake, Hwanwoong is gone, swaying in the arms of their Youngjo, who holds him with reverence. Seoho hops onto his shoulder and gives him a cow lick on one side.

He’s not something that does mean things per se but sometimes his actions come off a little brash and insensitive. They always make up at the end of the day though and that's what matters.


	5. turn to me awake and ask is everything all right

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Hwanwoong tells Seoho to pick some adder's tongue. He picks a fight with a berry bush instead.

When Hwanwoong sends them each off with a small list of things to gather, he cocks his eyebrow and places a hand on his hip, looking at Seoho. Seoho stares back at him, tail swaying to and fro. 

In the corner of his eye he also spots Youngjo, his tall figure looming at the door’s edge, toes pressing over the threshold of the living room, eyes soft and pretty, looking at Hwanwoong like he holds up all the stars in the sky. He chuffs a little bit, the sound like a barely-there sneeze and Hwanwoong fondly scratches under his chin. 

“Go fetch me some adder’s tongue, I’m out.” Hwanwoong commands, though his voice is soft and whiny. He’d taken on that edge ever since Youngjo came into their lives, a petulant sort of tone that seeks affection and attention, things which Youngjo willingly gives. Seoho curls underneath his palm and wiggles his butt, silently asking for some scratches on his rump.

“All on his own?” Youngjo asks curiously. This is the first time Hwanwoong has run out of ingredients to process, with a second pair of hands always helping him, the work had gone by twice as fast, meaning the plants had dwindled twice as fast too. Seoho’s entire body rumbles with purrs under Hwanwoong’s hand.

“Mhm, he’s the best at getting those dastardly things.” Hwanwoong praises, his tiny hand coming back to rub at the top of Seoho’s head, “Don’t play around too much either, I know how you get!” he admonishes. Seoho takes offense to that.

I get all my work done, he thinks petulantly.

“Meow.” he says instead. Then, he’s off. Springing from his haunches onto the open windowsill (something he’d forced open earlier that morning when he came back from his nightly games with a too long wiry stick in his mouth), and heads eastward to the mountains.

He takes the scenic route because he can. When it comes to work, Seoho is nimble and fast, fearless to a fault and wise to the ways of the forest. He's the oldest of the familiars in Hwanwoong's home and he's lived longer too, picking up herbs and flowers isn't an issue.

The mountains are heavily wooded, with trees older than Hwanwoong, though just barely, gnarled bark splintered into wistful smiles when he takes his usual winding path. He greets them with a casual tilt of his head before he’s climbing their trunks for a better vantage point. It’s something the forest has gotten used to by now, his wily form leaping like a monkey where other cats would usually walk the path they’d carved out all those centuries ago.

At the foot of the mountains, a colony of adder’s tongue makes their home, rooted and healthy. They sprout from the ground, split between the soil, their leaf vibrant green, their tubers stocky and strong and easy to pick. Seoho has, on many occasions, gone to the peaks of mountains to pick them, where they grow taller than their valley counterparts but it’s a cumbersome travel that takes more than one day. Not to mention the beasts that curl around the edge of the woods, jaws snapping in wait, looking for a moment to strike at him.

Seoho is still a cat, no matter how old or powerful he is. He’s hunted the underbush of the bosk clean of their kind, kept his house safe and sound whenever any came close, but doesn’t have the protection of his family when he ventures out too far. There are eyes in the woods and Hwanwoong’s power only reaches so far with them.

It also doesn’t help, Seoho knows, that his family worries for him when he’s gone for too long. The forest still has secrets he is not privy too and though not unkind, they are not entirely benevolent either. Keonhee worries himself sick sometimes, he knows, slumped by their door and inconsolable when Seoho doesn’t come back with the ebbing of the sun. Seoho sticks to the valley for their sake.

So, Seoho makes quick work of picking them, digging first around the root to ensure they come up clean, and piles the healthiest looking ones into his mouth, setting back home. 

On the way home, though, under a ray of sunlight shining directly upon it, he spots a bush of delectable berries. Their fruits practically shine under the sun, red and juicy, nice and round and Seoho pads up to it. 

The bush is bigger than him by a few handspans, and thorny near the top where the stems are plentiful but near the ground? There’s a small space, just big enough for him to squeeze into, and the berries dangling there look a right treat. Seoho delicately digs a hole just big enough to hold the adder’s tongue he’d just picked, rounds his attention back to the bush, and pounces.

He eats well. Perhaps too well. Time seems inconsequential to him when his mouth finds another sun-sweet berry, picking it from its stem and chewing on it, a burst of syrupy sweetness trickling down his chin. By the time Seoho feels full, his eyes start to droop, and he curls in on himself, tucks his nose into his tail and decides a nap is good.

Seoho doesn’t sleep in their home. It’s not that he dislikes it, in fact, he loves their home. He remembers watching Hwanwoong spend sleepless nights pouring over it, hands grey from cobbling stones together, building steadily, never stopping, Seoho loves nothing more than their little home. He remembers the emptiness of the home when Hwanwong finished, plopped on the floor and looking around at the big, wide space of their living room. The first thing he’d brought back for Hwanwoong was the straightest twig he could find, and it still sits on the mantle of the fireplace in his bedroom.

He doesn’t sleep in their home just in case he misses anything. At night, when his chaos settles just enough for him to look at his family, he can’t seem to close his eyes.

Being out in the wild is a whole different story. Hwanwoong thinks he spends his time playing - which he does more often than not - but the whole forest is a whole sun spot and he finds sleep easily there.

It’s no surprise then, that he sleeps for longer than he intends to, belly bared to the sun drifting through the leaves, his eyelids feel horribly heavy and he finds he doesn’t really want to wake up. A rustling stirs him from slumber though, and Seoho can make out the heavy footfalls of Yougjo’s lumbering gait, his thick tail swishing against the ground it’s dragged upon.

“There!” Youngjo yells, a sharp noise of surprise comes from his chest before Seoho feels himself being picked up. He blearily opens his eyes to see their Youngjo, their witch and coven quickly in tow. Seoho thinks he musters a smile, still too sleepy to really do much.

“You brat!” Hwanwoong chastises, rubbing a knuckle on his head, “You had us all worried, it’s almost night time, you know!”

Seoho does not know that. He feels a little bit bad and a lot sleepy still, licking away the taste of those delicious berries, looking over to where the rest of the familiars wind and slide between their darling dragon’s legs, whining and screaming at him. Hwanwoong’s eyes soften too, calming like the still of the lakes, and he shushes them all with a quick finger to his lips. He beckons them back in the direction of their home and they all start walking, in the basket on his arm, he can see the adder's tongue he picked for Hwanwoong.

Youngjo is big and warm and good. His thumb rubs the spot between his eyes and Seoho purrs softly, rumbling and pressing further into his hand for more affection. He carries him back, cradled like a babe, the way Seoho has seen mothers do to newborns, and gently scratches at his sticky chin, earning him a soft purr. He looks at Seoho, molten gold eyes kind and bright, before he fondly asks,

"Did you know that you snore?"

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> [this is what adder's tongue plants look like (not the flower)](https://external-content.duckduckgo.com/iu/?u=http%3A%2F%2Fwww.aphotoflora.com%2Fimages%2Fpteridophyta_ophioglossaceae_ferns%2Fophioglossum_azoricum_small_adders_tongue_00_26-05-06.JPG&f=1&nofb=1)


	6. i'll build again the world by my baby's hands

Youngjo has known pain before; one doesn’t live under the thumb of a bloodthirsty monarch and come away unscathed, especially as the only child of his endeavours. He has the scars to prove it, long arcing streaks across his back where he’s never quite learned to dodge in time, footing still unsure and sloppy, reminders of mistakes that could have cost him his life.

He’s lived in fear as well, been gripped with such trepidation he thought he would never see the light of day; where his father’s shadow loomed out in front of him, glow of the firelight fanning out behind him, as if even perdition itself couldn’t stand to hold him.

It’s relative, though. Ever since he found Hwanwoong, his days have been a joyous haze, like a honeyed sigh settling between the spaces of his ribs, sweetening his heart, cracking it open and finding the petal-soft love he didn't know he'd been capable of holding. Youngjo is happier than he can ever remember being.

Yet, he's never known pain so intimately before either. Some days Youngjo thinks he lives on borrowed time, sat crutched on the steeped orange blossom concoctions that Hwanwoong feeds him, pain blooming in every joint despite his darling's best efforts. 

Youngjo fixates on his hand, curling into his palm when Hwanwoong holds his face, bleary-eyed but still so focused on him.

"Darling…" he rasps, watching as Hwanwoong's face contorts, wishing he could kiss the worry away. Sweat beads at his temple, and Hwanwoong wipes it away with his thumb, gentle as foxglove swaying with the wind.

"Why didn't you tell me the teas weren't working anymore?" Hwanwoong intones softly, pressing a kiss between his furrowed brows. Almost instantly, Youngjo can feel the tension bleed out of him, leaning further into Hwanwoong's embrace,

"Didn't want you to worry." He whispers. Talking hurts, his throat burns with phantom bile, the skin of his neck itches from the inside out, nothing feels right. He doesn't feel right.

Any other time and his darling would have knocked him on the head for that, Youngjo knows. Instead, Hwanwoong pillows his head to his chest and croons, 

"You make me worry more when you don't tell me things."

In his heart of hearts, Youngjo knows this. He tells Hwanwoong everything, has long since learned his lesson that his darling can read the emotions across his face faster than he can hide them, but still. 

In the dead of night, Youngjo worries himself into a sorry state; he wonders, always wonders if maybe one day Hwanwoong will grow tired of his continually towering frame and lumbering gait, will maybe leave him for something better, far more suited to him in the woodland.

"I know what you're thinking." Hwanwoong speaks softly against the crown of his head, "Stop. You would sooner see the moving of the mountains than see me fall out of love with you."

"Baby…" Youngjo sighs, feels his throat tighten as he bites back a sob. He loves Hwanwoong, he really, truly does, knows it well when Hwanwoong holds him close just like this.

"Get some rest, darling." He helps back lay back down, tiny hand pressed to the middle of Youngjo's chest, "I'll be back soon."

He kisses him on the lips, chaste and sweet, before leaving, taking his tawny cloak off the coat rack with him. The hood is big and wide, and Hwanwoong pulls it over his head, closing the door behind him.

Youngjo focuses on the orange firelight that flickers and dances in the fireplace, shivering from the cold despite how fiercely the fire burns. Time passes like molasses and he's stuck in it, wrapped in their duvet and swaying halfway between a stinging pain and a dull ache. It never abates.

His teeth hurt, like they've been growing too long too quickly, biting into his lower lip as he rasps out puffs of air. Even breathing hurts. Youngjo isn't so sure there's a body part of his that isn't aflame with pain, so biting and acrid, darkness roaring behind his eyelids and even that too, is a sort of agony he's not ever known before. 

The doorknob of their bedroom suddenly rattles; a quick, swift, shaking of movement that doesn't seem to catch all the way and Youngjo's heart hammers against his ribs, nearly dropping to his stomach.

He's effectively ineffective; his still transforming body weakened and sallow, the strength in his bones dissipated and still bleeding out of him, Youngjo is a dead man walking. He holds no power over whatever perpetrator might have come into their quaint little home.

It comes as a welcome surprise then, when the handle finally comes down all the way, and the door is pushed open to reveal four, tiny furry bodies, yelling up a storm. 

Geonhak comes charging in first, a half-dead pheasant clenched in his jaw, blood dripping down his fur and he tracks it onto their duvet. He throws it at Youngjo's hands, and he watches in horror as blood steadily oozes out of the wound in its neck.

Keonhee and Dongju hop up onto the bed, soft kitten mews as they walk all over him before settling down on his chest and stomach, tucking their paws underneath them. The weight is familiar but disomforting, pain sears into his skin where they rest atop him, and he whines when he realizes he's too weak to gently nudge them off.

Seoho is still dangling on the doorknob, no doubt the culprit who's figured out how to open it, long amber tail flicking back and forth in irritation. He joins them on the bed too, chirping up a storm in Geonhak's direction. The black cat hisses at Seoho, paw smacking his face a few times before they erupt into a fierce but tiny scuffle, tumbling off the bed and hissing.

Youngjo fears the worst. He's heard of cats being… heartless before. That, like vultures, they have a tendency to circle the near-dead, sickly people, ready to strike whenever they desire. He's been around these little ones long enough to know that they're cats to the core, he does not doubt that they would strike at the weakest link of the home.

Keonhee starts purring after a while, fur thick and quivering, rumbling through his body and Dongju joins in, both seemingly unaware of just how much agony Youngjo stews in. They blink slowly at each other, which only seems to make their purrs louder. Youngjo doesn't know cats all too well, but he knows what purring means.

He starts weeping in spite of himself, soft pitiful puffs of air squeezing out of lungs with the weight of the cats on top of him, blurring his vision. The pheasant’s squirming slows and Youngjo smells death permeating the air, knowing that his time comes soon. He wishes he could have held Hwanwoong just a little bit tighter, for a little bit longer, had he’d known his fate would have ended this way.

Seoho paws at his head, chittering away when he doesn’t speak, still trying to bite back his sobs. Everything hurts. Through the haze of pain, the door opens again, and the relief is palpable on the back of his tongue when Hwanwoong stands there, basket filled with freshly uprooted herbs,

“Oh _darling_!” Youngjo weeps, trying in vain to reach out for him. Dongju and Keonhee tumble quickly off of him, circling his pillow instead; he finds it easier to breathe now. Hwanwoong rushes to his side, brows screwed together and face twisted in worry, “I thought I would never see you again.”

“Why would you ever think that?” Hwanwoong asks, carding a hand through his sweaty hair. His fingers are cool against his scalp, tipped golden with how valuable they are.

“Your familiars hate me. They were going to kill me.” he sniffles. The culprits in question leap immediately to action at the accusation, standing on their hind legs and pawing at Hwanwoong, claws catching on the fabric of his cloak. They mewl sadly, as if feeling wronged. Hwanwoong pat’s Seoho’s head, scratching behind his ear as he turns to Youngjo,

“What makes you say that, dear?”

“They were purring. They were so happy that I’m about to die.” Hwanwoong clicks his tongue at him for the last part, then gestures to the now dead bird on their duvet.

“And this little fellow?”

“An example.” Youngjo is sure of it. “Geonhak was showing me what I was going to look like soon.”

“Oh _darling_ ,” Hwanwoong sighs, giggling sweetly, sweeter than any honey in the world. “They’re helping you.”

“No.” Youngjo shakes his head as best he can. Hwanwoong kisses his fingers and he feels the pain ebb momentarily,

“Yes.” he says, “Dongju and Keonhee purr because that’s how they heal. They’re trying to heal you, silly darling.”

“What of the bird, then?”

“What of it?” Hwanwoong picks it up by the wing, grimacing at the limp body that follows, “Geonhak and Seoho probably just thought you needed to eat to feel better.”

As if to prove their point, Geonhak bites at the pheasant again, pulling it from Hwanwong’s tiny hand and pushing it back into Youngjo’s face, trills muffled in his throat. Hwanwoong runs a hand down his little spine, 

“No Geonhak, he can’t eat raw meat like that.”

Geonhak trills again, sad and despondent, though makes no further attempts to feed him. Youngjo feels a fool, burrowing his head into the pillow to hide his shame, pinking all the way down to his chest when Hwanwoong laughs at him.

“It’s okay, love.” Hwanwoong soothes him, “You didn’t know.” he kisses him for good measure, soaking up his sweat with the sleeve of his robe, not once grimacing at it. Youngjo would fell kingdoms for him.

“I love you.” he says, doing his best to hold Hwanwoong’s hand. “And your familiars.”

“I know.” his mind blurs with the new onset of pain, Hwanwoong kisses him again, “We love you too. Sit tight, I’ll make you something else for your growing pains, okay?”

Housed by Hwanwoong’s warmth, the purring of cats all around him, Youngjo closes his eyes and listens to the sound of his darling working. This is the first pain Youngjo has ever known to be bearable.

**Author's Note:**

> find me on twt [@mechanicharin](https://twitter.com/mechanicharin)  
> hope you enjoyed it, please let me know what you think!


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